It's a Trade
by Tobiko
Summary: Quinn isn't exactly the model of a healthy teenage girl. But she does look the part, so that's all good. Except that the troll has noticed her less than ideal eating habits and has decided to bug her. How annoyingly Rachel.  will be Faberry if continued
1. Chapter 1

**So I wrote this about a year ago and I do like it, but I'd forgotten about it. I've been reading a ton of Faberry recently so I decided to post it. I'm thinking about continuing it but I'm not sure, so if anyone has opinions I'd love them :)**

You are a hypocrite Quinn Fabray.

That's what she thinks to herself as she examines the labels on the vitamin water she's bought, as she tells her mother 'no thanks, big lunch' in the evening, as she bends over the toilet with her fingers stuck down her throat. You are a hypocrite. Months ago she'd told Mercedes to be proud, be brave, you are beautiful. She'd said, "If I'm willing to eat right for this baby, why am I not willing to do it for myself?"

Simple answer: because Quinn Fabray wasn't worth it.

Beth had been worth it. That baby, that life, was the one good thing Quinn had ever done. The bastard child of a sixteen year old slut. That sure said something about the rest of her pathetic life.

With exercise and diet she'd lost any baby fat a month before school started. She was back in Cheerios shape by August. Sue had put her back on the Cheerios with little effort on Quinn's part, just the promise of money and letting slip about Santana's boob job. So what if San hated her now? She was already miserable.

After Beth she'd accepted her mom's invitation to come back home and then decided to cut off ties with everyone over the summer. Mercedes had called every day at first but when her calls continued to go unanswered she started to call less and less until she stopped. She'd come over a few times trying to see Quinn but as instructed Mrs. Fabray told her each time that Quinn was busy/sick/dying/abducted, whatever.

Puck was more persistent, more desperate. He called, left messages, sent texts, even tried to break in once when Mrs. Fabray wasn't home and Quinn was hidden under the covers. He gave up only after Mrs. Fabray had threatened to call the cops. He still sent the occasional text. Quinn understood why he was so hurt. He'd told her he loved her and now she was ignoring him.

When she'd returned to school she hadn't extended an olive branch. She continued to ignore all of her friends.

For some reason she still treated herself to Glee, the one thing that still made her smile. She didn't speak much to any of her fellow Glee club members, but she sang.

Trade eating for song. She only deserved one pleasure at a time.

.

She'd eaten a bite of sandwich when Brittany (who still insisted on talking to her even after Quinn's constant freeze outs) had curiously asked if she'd eaten anything today and now she was in the bathroom trying to get it out of her system. After she finished and exited her stall she came face to face with a worried looking Rachel Berry, who was dripping red slushie onto the bathroom floor. Rachel pouted and asked, "Quinn? Are you ill?"

Quinn glared at Rachel and edged around her, careful not to get corn syrup onto her impeccable Cheerios uniform. "Bad cafeteria food," she replied hastily.

"You brought food from home."

"How would you know that Berry? Are you watching me? That is so creepy."

Rachel bit her lip but didn't back off. "Are you ok?"

"I'm fine."

The slushie was starting to dry in Rachel's hair but she was so focused on Quinn she didn't even notice. Rachel took a purposeful step toward Quinn. "Have you been eating Quinn? I can't remember the last time I saw-"

"Again Berry, are you spying on me?"

Her tone had the desired effect and Rachel reflexively cowered. But to Quinn's surprise she did not stay down. Rachel straightened her shoulders and her brow furrowed in annoyance. "What are you doing?"

Quinn shook her head. "You're such a drama queen. I wasn't doing anything. I had a bad lunch and it made me sick. That's all."

Rachel still didn't look convinced. She seemed to be debating something and then said, "Look, I'm sure you have no interest in what I may think, even if I do like you you don't like me. And my opinion means less than nothing to you, however, I know that you do like Glee and what you are doing is terrible for your voice. Obviously I didn't mention this when you were pregnant and throwing up because there wasn't much you could do about it but now that you're forcing yourself to for purely superficial reasons-"

"Oh please treasure trail, you're going to lecture me? I'm not the one who got dragged into Ms. Pillsbury's office for what you're talking about."

Rachel looked surprised and was struck dumb for a few seconds. "That was… a lapse in judgement. But how do you-"

"Santana periodically steals your bag and looks through your stuff. She found the pamphlet. She's also the one who takes your books and hides them in strange places around the school."

"But that's still happening. Santana's in glee club now."

"Well yeah. Santana hates you less than she used to. But that's like saying Kurt hates Puck less than he used to." Rachel's face fell and Quinn knew she was being meaner than she had to be. But Rachel needed to back off and Quinn wasn't above laying down the scheme of things. On a roll, Quinn narrowed her eyes and sneered at the tiny brunette and continued, "No, you know what? That's not even a fair assessment because Kurt and Puck are actually pretty much friends now. You, Rachel, inspire a special kind of hatred."

Rachel took a step back and she paled. She, for once, didn't have a thing to say. Back in charge of the situation, Quinn turned on her heel toward the sinks and started the water running to wash out her mouth. Rachel's lips were pressed into a thin line. Quinn expected her to get on with cleaning herself off and leave her alone, but to her amazement Rachel said quietly, "I'm very concerned for you Quinn. This… This is not healthy."

Quinn left without another word.


	2. Chapter 2

**Wow, thanks for the amazing support! It means a lot and has motivated me to continue this fic. I have a vague idea of where it's going, so it might take a while between updates but now I do want to finish it. :)**

She wasn't always pretty.

There was that terrible Lucy Caboosey phase.

Quinn doesn't talk about it much. See, when she was born she was perfect. Yay, perfect. That wasn't any sort of pressure or anything. From when she was born to when she turned about 10, she was the cutest little thing. The perfect ornament for the Fabray family tree. Her dad basically doted on her hand and foot because she was his little doll. Franny didn't exactly take it well, so there was always that rift between the sisters. If their dad needed an accessory, Quinn was the choice. Then she gained a few extra pounds. And it was honestly not that much. But she was no longer picture perfect. And her dad hated that. And the anxiety made Quinn eat more, made her start hating herself more. Badness ensued.

It got to a point where her own father ignored her.

She had already been a lonely kid (her parents were picky about who she could have play dates with), and now her dad pretended she didn't exist, her sister hated her and her mom didn't notice her over the perpetual glass of liquor she had in front of her. And the kids at school could now pick on her.

Basically her dad was thrilled when she asked for the extra help to get back into shape. And that made her hate herself more, because she realized he'd never loved her for anything but her beauty. But superficial love was better than none.

Quinn also decided to call herself by her middle name instead of her first and kick ass instead of get picked on.

She met Brittany and Santana in her dance classes. So they did know about her previous looks. But despite appearances they were amazing friends and never told anyone. Even after the boob job "slip". But that was probably one of the reasons Santana was having more trouble forgiving her for that, because San would never ever think of telling about Lucy.

Quinn preferred limiting her intake of food to purging, but whatever she needed to do to keep perfect.

Ok, that wasn't all.

It wasn't just the perfect thing. Because… It was really more about the fact that she liked the way the world was sort of hazy and light after a few days of barely anything to eat.

It really made it easier to ignore everyone.

.

Rachel kept staring at her. It was driving Quinn insane. More than.

She was being less obnoxious in Glee and devoting her time to watching Quinn like a hawk. Which was actually stressing out the club. For the first few minutes they had rejoiced. And then they'd realized they didn't know what to do without Rachel's direction. And Mr. Schue wasn't actually helpful. Probably something about Ms. Pillsbury was making him all… depressed Mr. Schue.

Then suddenly Rachel stood. "I think we should devote this meeting to songs about inner beauty."

Everything in Quinn bristled.

As if on cue, everyone in the Glee club started to sneer, as if they'd been coming up with ideas before this. "Didn't we already do this one like, ten million times?" Santana asked from the back. Quinn rolled her shoulders forward and concentrated on looking at the book in her lap.

"Sometimes we all need to be reminded of how beautiful we all truly are, on the inside."

Which seemed like kind of a moot point, since Quinn was pretty sure she was more ugly inside than out.

There was mixed debate and when Quinn peeked up from her book she could see the stubborn look on Rachel's face setting in.

Quinn really could not deal with this today. She stood up and cast cold eyes Rachel's way. "If this is what were doing today, I have better things to do with my time." Which was a lie. Glee was her favorite part of the day, but she didn't enjoy this feeling of not being safe in her own haven. Rachel's eyes became big and moist and she looked like she was about to start sobbing. Quinn recoiled in disgust at the unnecessary display of emotion. "Do not look at me like that Ru Paul!" she snapped.

The whole club had gone silent in shock. Everyone was looking at each other in confusion. Finn looked angry and was about to say something when, of all people, Santana said, "Whoa, Cap, what the hell?"

"Nothing Santana." Quinn said softly, cursing herself for such an outward emotive response. That shit was only supposed to go inward.

Finn, deciding to take a crack at chivalry, rose his voice and said loudly, "Apologize Quinn."

Quinn closed her eyes and chewed at her cheek to restrain herself from throttling the boy. She turned icy eyes toward him and he quailed. Finally, a small triumph. Quinn picked up her bag and left.

Behind her, she could faintly hear Brittany's confused, "Do we storm out too San? I don't understand what happened."

"I don't either B. Just sit tight."

To Quinn's relief no one followed.


	3. Chapter 3

"We're worried about you."

"Ew."

Santana rolled her eyes into the mirror as she applied a new layer of lip gloss. Quinn stood next to her refreshing her mascara. Brittany sat on the sink counter on the other side of Santana, peering at Quinn with her bottom lip stuck out slightly. "Shut up. You're our friend, no matter how hard you're trying to get us to fuck off. Yeah, we see that. Which, by the way, not cool. You're hurting Britt's feelings."

"You're making a big deal out of nothing."

"Q, you're a bitch, but you're my bitch so I'm really _really_ trying not to punch you here."

"Your eyes are meaner than they used to be, even at us. And your hands are all shaky. Sometimes it looks like you're going to fall off the pyramid, so I mess up part of my routine so that Coach yells and you can get down for a bit," Brittany said with wide, concerned eyes. Quinn flinched and capped her mascara, looking away. Had she been letting it get so obvious? Wow, she really was pathetic. She'd have to fix that.

"Look, I get that you're in some kinda funk about giving the lizard baby away-"

"You don't get to talk about her," Quinn said quietly, but there was such hatred in her voice it was if she'd shouted it. Santana and Brittany both leaned back in fear. Quinn had a cold fury under her skin that intimidated even Santana.

"Whatever," Santana scoffed, feinting indifference. But Quinn could see something behind her eyes, something that looked suspiciously like _pity_. Quinn hated Santana for that look. Brittany chewed on her bottom lip and her eyes were moist. No matter how hard Quinn tried, she couldn't hate Britt.

But most of all, Quinn hated herself.

.

"Sup Baby Mama."

Quinn turned around to see Puck lumbering toward her. His smile had a touch of hope to it. She had to kill that straight away. Quinn fixed him with her most empty stare. Different from both caring or anger. Quinn needed him to think she felt absolutely nothing for him. The pain on Puck's face made something deep inside of her ache but she kept her perfect mask.

"What."

"I just wanted to make sure- You kinda attacked my Jew Rach out of the blue in Glee yesterday and-" Puck stumbled over his words. He wouldn't do that with most other people.

"So?"

"So…like I thought you were over the Rachel hate. I thought you two were cool. You started to lay off her with the insults and junk."

"Just because Berry isn't even on my radar any more doesn't mean we're in any way friends."

"I wasn't saying that, it's just that we're supposed to be a team."

Quinn rolled her eyes. "Some team. Everyone hates Berry, it isn't as if me being overt about it is any better than me being a sneak like the others."

"I don't hate Rachel."

It infuriated Quinn that he was telling the truth. Of everyone in the club, Puck was usually the nicest to Rachel in his own way. Even when Finn was dating her he had tended toward the jerk end of the spectrum. A completely oblivious jerk, but a jerk nonetheless.

But _why_ did Puck like her? She was the most obnoxious person that Quinn had ever met. And she needed to keep her nose out of Quinn's business. Because for some reason whenever Quinn had something going on, Rachel was just _there_. Like an annoying gnat. One who cared too much about someone she should hate.

"So that's why you're talking to me? To defend her?"

Anger darkened Puck's face as he protested, "Fucking hell Quinn, you can be so frustrating. You know that isn't it. I'm _worried _about you."

"Well don't. It's a waste of your time."

Quinn got away from Puck as fast as she could because she was pretty sure if she stayed the guilt would kill her.

.

Because of her stupid outburst in Glee they started to _pay attention _to her more. Quinn was good at the mask thing. She'd perfected her technique all her life, but for the first time people who actually knew her were looking for the cracks.

When she had a dizzy spell in the hallway suddenly Artie was behind her, pretending to knock into her so that she could fall into his lap. Mike quietly slid up to her in study hall and made his fingers dance along the side of her text book in an attempt to make her smile. Kurt and Mercedes cornered her after school to ask her if she wanted to have a girls slumber party with them and when she had said no they'd tried to convince her that "at least a movie night is in order", which she had declined as well. At Cheerios practice Brittany had offered her her whole bag of goldfish because she hadn't seen Quinn eat that day. Quinn didn't think it would be a surprise to anyone that she had not taken then goldfish crackers, because it was essentially a bag of mush. Brittany thought that she was supposed to put her goldfish in an aquarium for storage before eating them. By the time Quinn left McKinley she felt like not only had she battled her way through another school day but she had narrowly dodged rounds of friendly fire.

Conspicuously, she hadn't seen Rachel's face all day. And that almost worried Quinn most.


	4. Chapter 4

Quinn listened to her math teacher with only half of her attention. She had already done the problems on the board and had come up with the correct answers. So she noticed when Mr. Schue stopped at the door and lingered, looking as if he didn't want to be there. He fidgeted with the strap of his man purse and gulped as he looked around the classroom. When his eyes locked on her his face fell. And suddenly Quinn knew that something was _very_ wrong.

Mr. Schue finally stepped into the classroom and motioned to the math teacher. After a few whispered moments Mr. Schue turned toward Quinn and said, "Quinn? Would you come with me please?"

Quinn stood robotically and followed Mr. Schue out into the hallway. A sense of dread settled in her gut. Where was he taking her? They weren't headed towards the office. They were headed-

Quinn made her face as impassive as she could as Mr. Schue led her into Ms. Pillsbury's office. Ms. Pillsbury smiled gently at Quinn as she entered. She nodded at Mr. Schue behind Quinn as if in thank you, but her attention was all on Quinn as the blonde entered her office. Quinn's mother sat in the chair closest to the door with a look of vague confusion on her face as if she wasn't quite sure how she came to be there and had even less of an idea why she was even there in the first place. And Rachel- Rachel sat in a chair on the other side of a vacant chair next to Quinn's mom, back ramrod straight and her hands fisted into her lap, staring forward and avoiding Quinn's cold eyes.

Quinn had never hated anyone as much as she hated Rachel Berry right then. What the _fuck_ did the troll think she was doing?

Quinn put a tight smile on her face as she sat down between her mother and Manhands and said in her best prom queen voice, "Sorry Ms. Pillsbury, I have no idea what's happening. Would you mind telling me what's going on?"

To her annoyance (and surprise), Ms. Pillsbury didn't bat an eye. She wasn't thrown off for even an instant by what Quinn thought of as her disarming look. Ms. Pillsbury just smiled sadly at her and said, "Well Quinn, your friend Rachel has expressed some concerns about your health and we called your mom in so that we could have a talk with you."

"She's not my friend," Quinn corrected firmly and maybe too quickly. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Rachel stiffen beside her.

Ms. Pillsbury chose to ignore the outburst and plowed onward. "Rachel said that she found you in the bathroom a few days ago throwing up in a stall. Is this true?"

"The lunch in the cafeteria was bad," Quinn explained with a huff of annoyance. "Honesty, it shows how very little she thinks of me that she just jumped to the conclusion that I was making myself sick. When she accosted me after I left the stall I _explained_ that to her but she refused to believe me. She's making a big deal out of nothing."

Will sighed from the doorway and Quinn turned to see a look of relief cross his face. He stepped forward boldly and beamed at Ms. Pillsbury. "See? It was all some sort of misunderstanding. I knew that we could solve this easily. Rachel has a flair for the over dramatic." Even though she hated the girl, Quinn couldn't help but glare at Mr. Schuester for his outright dismissal of Rachel. Especially because in this case she was right. But Quinn wasn't about to step in and defend her.

But she didn't have to. Ms. Pillsbury gave Mr. Schuester a patient smile and said gently, "Will, this is a delicate situation. What Rachel has come to tell me is very serious. Even if Quinn denies it I have to pursue the matter to the best of my ability."

Quinn scowled at Ms. Pillsbury. Why didn't she just drop it? For all her timidness, Ms. Pillsbury was surprisingly perceptive and persistent when it came to her charges. And Quinn wasn't fooling her. How bothersome. The good news was that Mr. Schue looked skeptical and her mom looked…well, like she didn't care much either way. And Rachel still refused to look at her, as if she feared if she met Quinn's eyes she would be turned to stone.

Ms. Pillsbury gave Quinn a kind smile and moved to grab a pamphlet, but she paused as her fingers hovered over the paper and she sighed and withdrew it. "I don't think that pamphlet will have any impact on you to be honest. You've always been very strong willed Quinn. And you don't like admitting you need help. But sometimes you do. And maybe people don't offer it often, even if they can tell you need it. But Rachel here noticed and she came to a teacher for help because she knew she couldn't do this on her own." Ms. Pillsbury gave Rachel an encouraging nod. "You may not think of Rachel as your friend, but she is one for caring so much about you. She knew you'd get mad and she still came for help."

Quinn tried to think of a snappy reply, but her voice was caught in her throat. Without meaning to she looked at Rachel. And Rachel was looking straight at her. Her heart skipped a beat and she tried to put on her most venomous look. But Rachel didn't break her gaze and that scared Quinn more than any glare of hers could ever scare the diva.

_Run_, every inch of her screamed.

Quinn stood. "I don't have to sit here and listen to you psychobabble at me when I don't need it." She grabbed her bag and left, ignoring her mom's half startled call and pushing past Mr. Schuester. She could still feel Rachel's eyes on her all the way down the hall.


End file.
